Shaman tactics
General tactics Weapon choice All Shamans can use staves, one-handed axes and maces, daggers, fist weapons, and shields. With talents, a Shaman may also learn to use two-handed axes and maces and Dual Wielding. Dual Wielding Shaman do not often train in two-handed weapons. Most mid- and high-level Shamans carry several weapons - generally a two-handed weapon, a one-handed weapon, and a shield. Lower-level characters will generally choose one weapon set, and not carry spares. Dual Wielding Shamans will, of course, carry a second one-handed weapon. Weapon choice will change depending on the situation, and your spec. * Enhancement Shaman will almost always use their chosen specialized weapon combination, preferring to DPS down the mobs before they take much damage. * Elemental Shaman will almost always prefer a shield to assist them in taking less damage. In instances, they may choose to use a staff, if their staff has better stats (intellect, +damage, spell crit, etc) than their one-handed weapon and shield combination. * Restoration Shaman will make their choice similar to Elemental Shaman, although their important stats will be different. Some basic tips for selecting a weapon combination: * Against melee opponents, you may want to use your shield to mitigate damage. * Against casters, use the 2H weapon. Spells ignore armour when determining damage so the shield provides little value. Your goal is to kill them quickly using both weapon damage and spells. * When healing, the weapon's attributes should determine which configuration you choose as you will most likely not be engaged in combat as a healer. For example, if your staff has a +int buff on it, then you would select that weapon so as to increase your mana pool. Weapon buffs and speed *Flametongue Weapon: Ignores damage reduction due to high armor, high, steady damage, a great all-around buff for grinding, PvE, PvP. *Frostbrand Weapon: Procs fairly often, decent burst damage, has a very useful movement slowing effect. *Rockbiter Weapon: Must bypass damage reduction due to high armor, but offers high, steady damage. Use against mobs with high fire resistance. Great with high crit chance. *Windfury Weapon: Unbeatable burst damage, procs fairly often, can easily win a PvP fight but very unpredictable with regard to aggro management. Best with slow weapons (but still very good with fast ones), great with high crit chance and can deliver some massive returns when combined with the Shamanistic Rage talent. Fast weapons are recommended for non-Stormstrike/non-PvP Shamans, especially Elemental and Restoration Shamans, who should use Flametongue Weapon, as Flametongue scales much better on faster weapons. Enhancement Shamans who do not dual wield are encouraged to use Windfury, and will benefit most from two one-handed weapons with high top-end damage - this generally means slower weapons - for reasons explained exhaustively here. Before The Burning Crusade, two-handed weapons were recommended for Enhancement Shamans, particularly in PvP. This was because Windfury would hit, and often crit, dealing a lot of damage. Immediately following a Windfury proc with Stormstrike and Earth Shock would often result in an instant kill, before the target had a chance to heal, be healed, or run. With the changes to Windfury since the release of the expansion, coupled with the much larger health pools of level 70 characters in relation to damage caused, a slow two-handed weapon will not cause enough burst damage to kill a target outright, even with a Windfury crit. However, the high burst damage is still powerful and hard to heal, and two-handed weapons are still devastating in PvP. As an alternative, enhancement shamans may choose to select very fast weapons to increase the likelihood of a Critical Strike and the activation of Flurry and Unleashed Rage. Combined with moderate hit and crit ratings, these useful effects will basically always be on. Placing Flametongue Weapon or Rockbiter Weapon on the main hand weapon while placing Frostbrand Weapon on the offhand will maximize damage on the main hand while leaving the possibility of an enemy-slowing Frostbrand proc -- a deadly combination in PvP. Combat Whatever weapon choice you make, make sure you have a weapon buff on at all times. If you are soloing, always keep your Lightning Shield or Water Shield active, and be prepared to reactivate it in the middle of combat, possibly repeatedly (preferably after casting another spell, so as to not needlessly trip the 5 second rule). Be aware that Lightning Shield generates extra threat, so use it with care in group situations. The standard pull for a Shaman uses Lightning Bolts, followed by a Flame Shock (or Earth Shock on a caster). Since Shocks are instant, this in effect damages the mob up to four times before it has a chance to hit back. The actual number of Lightning Bolts cast in the pull will depend on talents - Enhancement will likely cast one or two bolts before shocking (if they bother at all -- a Stormstrike followed by a shock will do more damage and is more mana efficient), while Elemental Shaman may manage as many as three Lighting Bolts, due to shorter cast times. Enhancement After this initial burst damage, single non-elite mobs should not require further spell casting. It is a good idea to keep lower-powered versions of Earth Shock and Frost Shock in reserve, to interrupt casters and to slow runners, should the necessity arise. Otherwise, maintaining Flame Shock will support your melee damage. The Stormstrike effect should be active on any mob you plan to Earth Shock for a rather mana efficient 20% damage boost. Elemental/Restoration Caster Shamans may kite enemies with a combination of Lightning Bolt and Frost Shock. This can be expensive in terms of mana, but may enable the Shaman to down relatively high-level mobs. On normal mobs of a similar level, the Shaman may allow the mob into melee range, using a fast weapon with Flametongue Weapon, as well as Lightning Shield, to serve up some DPS between casting Lightning Bolts, and alternating Flame Shock with Earth or Frost Shock. Totems The four elemental totem types become available by way of certain quests. These quests become available several levels below the level at which the totem spells become trainable, ensuring that a Shaman need not go out of their way to complete them immediately. Obviously, they should be completed as soon as possible, but find quests in the same area so as not to waste time. Selecting totems to maximum advantage is more art than science - sometimes, it may be most efficient not to drop any totems at all, especially when not in a party. Only one totem of each element can be used at a time, and this must be considered when choosing the combination that is most beneficial. Other factors include which party members can gain advantage from which totems, and which totems will affect your target. For example, Stoneskin Totem on affects people being attacked, whereas Strength of Earth Totem will improve all melee DPS. This makes Stoneskin useful when your casters are going to AoE, or against possibly against Cleaving mobs, while Strength of Earth is likely to be better at other times. Similarly, Searing Totem will deal extra damage, but in close proximity to other mobs, it may accidentally aggro an add before you have a chance to use Totemic Call. Similarly, the AoE fire totems, Magma Totem and Fire Nova Totem, may break crowd control effects if placed too close to controlled mobs. It is also a good idea to consider requests from your party members, as some classes will prefer different totems based on specs - a Combat Rogue will love Windfury Totem, but an Assassination Rogue will prefer Grace of Air Totem, as Windfury does not stack with Poisons. Several totems have an aggro radius, including Mana Spring Totem, Healing Stream Totem and Earthbind Totem, as well as the damage-dealing Fire totems, and Stoneclaw Totem. Elemental totems do not have an aggro radius, but the Elementals themselves do. It should be noted that Fire Nova Totem will draw aggro as soon as it is cast, causing any untapped mobs in the area to try to destroy it before it goes off. As this totem is best suited for encounters with multiple mobs, it is advisable to threaten all nearby mobs, such as with a Chain Lightning pull, or to use it in conjunction with a Stoneclaw Totem. To best manage your totems, a totem timer mod is recommended. This will enable you to use Totemic Call just before they time out, giving some extra mana efficiency before replacing them. Also note that totems activate the Global Cooldown, meaning it will take at least four seconds to place all four totems. It is therefore advantageous to place totems before a pull. Talents Selecting talents effectively is a bit more subtle than with some of the other classes. The Enhancement tree is often the level grinding talent tree. Many Shamans pick this as their primary tree before level 70. It allows the Shaman to kill a few monsters, then heal to full, and repeat. While some choose to respec at 70, with reasonable gear an Enhancement Shaman can keep up with other classes in end-game DPS - although they suffer being a glass cannon without crowd control in PvP. Itemization pre-60 is quite poor for this tree, but even with mediocre gear, DPS and survivability does tend to be higher than Elemental spec. In Outland, class set items are mostly not geared for Enhancement. Fortunately, non-set items are available that allow Enhancement Shamans to perform at an extremely competitive level. Elemental is typically the end-game PvP shaman's primary tree, as well the tree used by most "hybrid" players. Reduced spell costs and increased spell damage are the base of this tree. Lightning Mastery reduces the cast time of lightning spells to 2 seconds, but they are still affected by +spell damage as if they were a second slower. Elemental Mastery offers a mana-free 100% crit nuke, once every 3 minutes. When used with Chain Lightning, all three bounces will crit, and when combined with a +spell damage trinket - especially a powerful one such as Talisman of Ephemeral Power or Zandalar Hero Charm - will land for an amazing amount of damage, even on a poorly equipped shaman. Most Elemental Shamans, as well as "Hybrid" players, will use Restoration as the secondary tree, as caster gear supports an in-combat switch to healing in emergencies. Also, by giving up Totem of Wrath, 40-point Elemental Shaman can get Nature's Swiftness from the Restoration tree. Restoration is the Healing tree. It can grant a 70% chance to not be interrupted while casting heals, increased range on totems, as well as cheaper and stronger heals. Nature's Swiftness grants an instant cast spell once every 3 minutes, allowing an instant spell every 3 minutes. Mana Tide Totem gives your group roughly 30% of their total mana back every 5 minutes. Earth Shield grants a 1/3 chance that its target will be healed for a small amount when they take damage, as well as giving a chance to avoid interruption to casting, and is also affected by +healing stats. Improved Chain Heal makes the uniquely Shaman heal even better, particularly for end-game raid healing. Good talent builders are available at WoWhead and World of Warcraft. Key spells As with all classes, some of the shaman's spells are more useful than others. Some have uses that are not immediately obvious. * Shocks are a valuable part of the Shaman class. Earth Shock is extremely useful against casters or in PvP to disrupt casting. Flame Shock, like any DOT, is particularly useful against stealth. Frost Shock, especially when combined with Earthbind Totem, makes a good snare. Frost Shock also generates additional threat. Using Rank 1 of these spells produces the same side-effect as the highest rank for little mana cost, but also do very limited damage. However, Rank 1 spells can crit, and cause an Elemental Shaman to enter the Clearcasting state. * Ghost Wolf aids escaping significantly, particularly with the Improved Ghost Wolf talent or Nature's Swiftness (which makes it instant-cast). Several Shaman PvP rewards offer boots that give an additional 15% speed boost while in Ghost Wolf form. It is also available at level 20, making Shamans the fastest class in the game at that level. * Astral Recall allows Shamans to teleport to their Hearth location every 15 minutes. It is on a separate timer to the Hearth Stone, allowing the Shaman to Hearth home without using up a precious 1hr cooldown. Many Shaman choose to destroy their Hearth Stone and use Astral Recall exclusively, saving bag space. * Mana Spring Totem and Mana Tide Totem are two totems that will appeal to all grouped casting classes. Increasing the mana regeneration of a party is one of the most vital roles a Shaman will play and significantly reduces the down time of your group. * Grounding Totem is a kind of pre-cast counterspell. Its casting cost is low (100 mana), and it absorbs every single-target (non-AoE) detrimental spell cast at the Shaman or his group while the totem buff is active, but is destroyed by the first direct damage spell it absorbs. It has a short cooldown. * Reincarnation is a unique, self-resurrection ability. It is very similar to having a Warlock Soulstone buff; as with these, Shamans should be very careful about the spots where they die. Sometimes Reincarnation is used for wipe recovery, but many Shaman (especially healers) use it to continue a fight after dying, much like a Druid battle rez. Reincarnation has a 60 minute cooldown, but this can be reduced to 40 minutes with 2 talent points in the Restoration tree. * Elemental Totems produce a Guardian Elemental, which will assist a Shaman. The Earth Elemental has high threat and health, but does not do much damage. The Fire Elemental has AoE and Fire Shield abilities. Elementals will leash to their totems. They last for 2 minutes, and have a 20 minute cooldown. You can only have one Elemental active at a time. Elementals *can* be healed -- an Earth Elemental can be a highly effective off-tank for multiple adds if it is healed. * Bloodlust/Heroism is an ability learned at level 70, which grants a 40 second buff which increases melee, ranged and spell haste, as well as reducing the length of the global cooldown. It also increases unit size. PvE tactics Solo PvE tactics When soloing, totems that affect your group will, naturally, not be as cost-effective. Often, you will want to reserve mana for Lesser Healing Waves, so might not drop totems as often. However, if you can position yourself right, within reach of multiple mobs but not within their aggro range, you can put down totems and pull each to your spot. You will almost always be more than a match for a single mob of equal, or even slightly higher, level. If you find yourself fighting more than one mob, a Stoneclaw Totem can provide the time you need to finish off one before the other destroys the totem. When fighting multiple opponents, it will be worth throwing in some extra damage spells. Nature's Swiftness comes in handy if you find yourself hurting while in these situations. Group PvE tactics The Shaman can play many roles in a group, including melee, caster, and support. He is not as strong as a specialist at any of these, but he can quickly shift gears if needed. Some general notes: * Stoneskin Totem is useful sometimes. If you are being attacked by multiple lower level mobs it can put a nice sized dent in their damage. * Strength of Earth Totem is helpful to all classes dealing melee DPS. * Disrupting enemy casters with Earth Shock helps deal with healers and ranged casters * Windfury Totem dramatically increases the DPS and rage buildup of your frontline warriors, and for Combat Rogues. However, for Assassination Rogues, Grace of Air Totem combined with Flametongue Totem is superior. Hunters and Feral Druids will also prefer Grace of Air, but will not benefit from a Flametongue totem. If your group is caster-based, it may be better to use Wrath of Air Totem - particularly if you yourself are playing a caster/healer role. * Fire totems consume large amounts of mana, and should be used sparingly, especially if playing as the healer. * Quick casts of Cure Disease and Cure Poison can cancel enemy DoT attacks - you can also use Poison Cleansing Totem and Disease Cleansing Totem for large groups or repeated poisoning/diseasing. The totems cost a similar amount of mana to use, but costs climb if by dropping them you are replacing another Water totem. * Frost Shock and Earthbind Totem can slow down enemy adds or prevent fleeing mobs from gathering reinforcements. * Grounding Totem and Tremor Totem are situationally useful -- against casters, grounding totem is useful for its cost; it can also absorb Curses and other non-damaging Debuffs. Tremor Totem wakes Sleep and counters Fear, although the latter function is hampered by the slow pulse rate of the totem. * Healing Stream Totem and Mana Spring Totem add a good curve to your total heals if you use them correctly. +heal effects do come into play with Healing Stream, making it a very effective (and efficient) group HoT. * Fire and Earth Elemental totems are excellent ways to recover from a sloppy pull - Earth Elemental will instantly draw the threat of any adds and Fire Elemental will gladly nuke away at them. Raid PvE tactics *You best serve the raid placed in a homogenized group (only melee types and hunters, or only mana-users). *If you are in a group with much melee, you should place Strength of Earth Totem and Windfury Totem, Grace of Air Totem, Wrath of Air Totem, Totem of Wrath or possibly Tranquil Air Totem if you are not in a main tank group. Healing Stream Totem can sometimes be useful if you have enough +healing stacked. *If you are in a group with hunters or rogues, Grace of Air Totem should be used along with Mana Spring Totem and Strength of Earth Totem. *If you are in a group with casters, Mana Spring Totem, Wrath of Air Totem are best, along with Mana Tide Totem or Totem of Wrath if you have it. *In a fear fight, such as with Nightbane or Onyxia, place Tremor Totem in the middle of where your group will be situated. *In a fight where you will take a lot of elemental damage, such as Murmur, place the appropriate resistance totem (Fire Resistance Totem, Nature Resistance Totem, or Frost Resistance Totem). Resto raiding Though you will not be as good at single target healing as a priest or druid, you can easily surpass them and be exceptionally useful through the careful use of Chain Heal. * Generally, Healing Wave is the best option for single-target raid healing because it receives the most benefit from your +healing gear, is more mana efficient and benefits from Healing Way. If you find yourself over-healing (wasting mana healing a teammate for more then their maximum health), use a ranked-down heal. * If your target for healing took a critical strike or several people are being hit for moderate damage, Lesser Healing Wave is a good emergency heal to buy time until you can cast a bigger Healing Wave. * When handling multiple tanks, Cleave mechanics or any other situation where multiple targets are taking damage, Chain Heal gets an excellent bonus from +healing, and independant crits will proc Ancestral Healing. * If you run out of mana, and have the totem from Maiden of Virtue, you can use rank 1 Healing Wave for no cost, outside of the 5-second rule, and still give your tank a good chance at Ancestral Healing. While healing, it is usually best to stay as far away from your healing target as possible while still being in healing range to minimise threat. When healing the main tank, use Earth Shield and Healing Wave to take advantage of Healing Way. Raiding gear Since you will be healing most of the time in raids, you want to look for the stats that will help you in the regard. The attributes to focus on are: *Mana/5 *+Healing *Intellect *Stamina The Tier 3 set The Earthshatterer from Naxxramas is an excellent example of gear optimized for Shaman healing. Level 70 sets provide gear optimized for each talent spec. Raiding talents Most of the Restoration tree is very useful for raiding as a shaman. The most important talents include: *Healing Focus *Nature's Swiftness *Purification *Mana Tide Totem *Earth Shield *Healing Way *To a lesser degree, Totemic Focus and Ancestral Healing are useful raiding talents. Enhancement Raiding Enhancement raiders can expect to spend 70-90% of their time DPSing and 30-10% of their time healing. Enhancement raiders bring the strongest buffs of any class/spec to a physical damage group and are often undervalued until one is seen in action. In most fights the Enhancement raider will function exactly like a rogue with the exception that he buffs the party and has useful utility totems such as tremor totem, grounding totem, and resist totems (which allow him to replace the holy paladin in the main tank's group). Also the ability of a shaman to drop multiple resist totems is an invaluable asset in some fights. There are a few fights that are extremely melee unfriendly or simply require an immense amount of healing. This is where it becomes even more beneficial to have an enhancement shaman over say a 2nd rogue as he can put on healing gear and not only become another healer but reduce the number of people in melee range without become dead weight to the party. Raiding gear Hit ratings stated assume +9% hit from talents (notice that we need significantly more +hit than rogues and warriors due to different game mechanics) all stats stated in table above are unbuffed. *Bare minimum: are stats that are the absolute minimum in any one area you can have and expect to raid. If you fall below in any category you will be pretty much dead weight. *Acceptable: these numbers are easily achievable with blue gear and will bring you to an average/good contribution to the party. *Target Numbers: These numbers will give you top performance and if you hit one of them you are better off investing in another lacking stat in the future as you will see a greater overall increase to your raid contribution. Raiding talents The Enhancement Tree is a fairly straightforward path but here are some of the essential talents for raiding. * Dual Wield * Dual Wield Specialization * Unleashed Rage * Enhancing Totems or Improved Weapon Totems there is some debate as to which is better * Nature's Guidance * Totemic Mastery The importance of this to a spread out raid group cannot be understated * Shamanistic Rage This ability truly comes into it's own on a boss fight as you will find the need for extra mana mid-fight. The high attack power of a well geared raider will give you wonderful mana return allowing you to sustain a higher level of combat for much longer than you would be able to otherwise. Elemental Raiding Elemental raiders will find themselves in a similar situation as most casters with the exception that they also need to buff the party. Elemental/resto gives a little more off-healing ability than Enhancement/resto due to gear compatibility between elemental and resto. Elemental shamans can expect to spend most of their time doing damage and buffing the party but should not be afraid to throw the odd heal out mid fight. Raiding gear Due to the Elemental Focus talent (your next damage spell's cost is reduced by 60% after you crit with a damage spell), spell crit has become a very important stat for elemental raiders. Elemental raiders should shoot for close to 30% crit (with talents) then start focusing on spell damage and finally intellect and stamina. Make sure you are critting for at least 2k with your lighting bolt before you start to invest heavily in crit however. Stat progression: *1) Get your crit rating with your lightning bolt to 20% (can get 11% from talents so this should not be difficult at all). *2) Get enough spell damage to crit for 2k damage on a lightning bolt. *3) Get up to 27% crit with lightning bolt. *4) Work on increasing your spell damage and crit equally until you hit about 30% LB crit rating. *5) Focus solely on + spell damage. See also: Shaman Elemental Equipment Raiding talents These talents are very important/useful for raid situations * Lighting Mastery * Convection * Concussion * Elemental Focus You must have this talent * Elemental Fury * Elemental Precision * Totemic Mastery * Tidal Mastery * Unrelenting Storm * Totem of Wrath This spell is designed for raids, is very useful in raids, gives a useful fire totem to caster shamans (an otherwise unused totem) and should not be overlooked by a raiding shaman due to it's lack of non raiding capabilities. It is however the subject of hot debate and some people may not find it worth taking over Nature's Swiftness. PvP Tactics Solo PvP tactics One good trick involves some quick mouse work. When trying to escape an opponent, autorun away from them. Then, jump, quickly rotate around in the air, Frost Shock, and rotate back before you land. This allows you to snare your opponent with no loss in forward momentum. A good way to open a fight is to cast a lightning bolt, then a chain lightning, and then a shock. This will provide high burst DPS as the slow moving lightning bolt will hit close to the chain lightning and the shock or damage other nearby enemies. Enhancement Dual Wielding can destroy cloth very quickly. A good tactic is to drop a SoE totem and a GoA totem. Frost shock if you want to chase enemies and get massive crits from behind, Earth Shock to interrupt casting, Flame shock to stop rogues stealthing. Group PvP tactics (personal opinion) Here's what I think a Shaman's role in group PvP is: 1. Kill enemies. 2. Heal/save allies if you can, but don't disregard rule #1. It's generally pretty simple to snare a Rogue that's chasing after a caster, or to Earth Shock a Mage while he is casting a spell at an ally. Enhancement shamans are great against casters (Mages, Warlocks, Priests, non-feral Druids) and we should chop them up as quickly as possible Earth Shocks is a killer here, but in group PvP, you can't spam it, due to it's high mana cost. Grounding totem and lightning shield are awesome against these classes as they continue to work even after you have been feared/sheeped. Typically the best strategy against a rogue, which is easily our biggest enemy for enhancement shamans, is to not fight them. If you get jumped, bail out. Shock and Ghost wolf. An even geared rogue will destroy an even geared enhancement shaman. This might change with all the stamina gear from BC. Once the rogue can no longer stunlock you, you can easily out DPS the rogue. Unfortunately, a good rogue can get you down to at least 40% before cheap shot and kidney shot wear off. Elemental shamans are extremely useful against melee resistant (Warriors, Paladins, Rogues, Bear druids) characters due to the extremely high burst DPS and because others will have difficulties against them. If they try to melee you, frost shock, earthbind, and/or warstomp and run. Your best damage is lightning bolts and you can't really throw them while you're being hit in melee. In mass melee, when you run hopefully the aggressor will switch to a closer target which will allow you to turn and devastate with your bolts. In 1v1 combat, your shocks and lightning shield should be more than enough to take them down with the exception of paladins and druids; who will require you to speed DPS/focus fire in order to beat their healing/shield abilities. Rogues are actually a lot easier for elemental shamans. Lightning shield and magma totem (or even searing totem) can give rogues a ton of problems due to the ability to DPS the rogue even while stunlocked. Yes, with the caveat that frost shock can be extremely effective psychologically against your opponent. An opponent running at 50% movement speed and being run around is going to have only one thing on their mind: Get to you, and kill you. An average opponent at this point will not be fighting nearly as well as usual, and will make mistake after mistake. Equally, using a slow weapon against a rogue, keeping them frost shocked and only getting near enough to them to swing as your weapon becomes ready will drastically reduce their DPS. The only catch to this is dagger rogues, who have numerous abilities to stop you in your tracks. It is best to entirely kite them using repeated frost shocks until they are at least half health. Also, depending what rank of which shock you have most recently received makes a huge difference in damage. My frost shock will, in a few levels, surpass my flame shock by approximately 40 damage I believe, and chain casting flame shock takes away around 1/4 of the total damage. (50% damage instantly, 50% over 12 seconds, recast after 6 seconds is 50% of the dot, thus 25% of the overall damage). Finally, frost shock is the only shock to use against a hunter. Given the chance to either wing clip you and run, they will do so immediately, and a shaman does rather poorly against a hunters ranged DPS unless he is a very good elemental or resto shaman. Raid PvP tactics In each battleground, Shaman can do a lot. If your group stays close to each other, totems will be an advantage. You can choose to spend your time beating face with whatever weapon you have, or you can take on a support role. Keep your mana pool in mind -- with all of the totem dropping + shocking + healing that you can do, odds are you're out of mana before you're out of health unless multiple people are beating on you... if you're out of mana, dying in Battlegrounds will bring you back with nearly full mana in under 30 seconds. Overall, a Shaman can be really helpful everywhere you want to be. About Shocks in Battleground PvP Flame Shock - any class with stealth abilities Frost Shock - any situation where you need to slow someone Earth Shock - interruption of casters You can use the very inexpensive Rank 1 effect of these spells to achieve the same secondary effects (damage over time to break stealth, slow, and spell interruption) if you're concerned about mana availability. The rank of the shock will not affect their ability to resist. Build a custom toolbar or hotkey that places these lower rank spells within easy reach so that you're not fumbling around to find them. In a lot of cases you don't need to do direct damage to be effective in PvP. Keeping this in mind makes you a fantastic addition to your team in PvP. Warsong Gulch A Shaman makes an adequate flag runner, but Druids are better. Remember that Ghost Wolf is a dispellable magic effect -- it can be removed from you, then you're left carrying the flag without being fast. You can't shapeshift out of restraint effects like a Druid can, so you are easily rooted or slowed. Since Patch 1.10, you can rely on your trinkets while in Ghost Wolf form. This gives you more tools to use while carrying the flag, such as *Insignia of the Horde to get out of stun or snare effects *Defiler's Talisman, which provides you with a little bit of damage absorption when activated *or Nifty Stopwatch, which gives you an additional speed boost. If you're engaged in melee combat while carrying the flag, don't forget to put on your shield for some extra damage reduction. You can support your team's runner by dropping Earthbind Totems and healing. You don't have to worry about aggro from PvE mobs, so dropping your searing totem can be extra DPS. Magma Totem will break rogue or druid stealth usually before they can get to you. Tremor Totem can interrupt fear effects, and using purge on priests or other cloth mobs will remove their self buffs -- dropping someone by 54-70 stamina points has a noticeable, immediate impact on their survivability. If you are simply there to farm Honor Kills, Placing a Sentry totem on top of the Enemy Base roof is a good tactic because you can see if their are any ally for you to Tear to shreds. Arathi Basin Always drop Tremor Totem when defending a node - it does not help against rogue stuns but it will help with fear and charm effects from priests and warlocks. To help against sap, stay in Ghost Wolf form. In this form, you are considered a Beast and as such are immune. You will be vulnerable to Druid sleep and Hunter fear effects, but Tremor Totem will help defend against this. Arathi Basin means small groups of people fighting in one place - your totems can make a serious difference. Make sure that if you are defending a node that everyone at that node is in the same group with you, because buff totems only affect people in your 5 man group, not the entire raid. The oft-forgotten Far Sight spell can be used to great effect, particularly from the Lumbermill, to help direct traffic. If you have 2-3 people defending you at that node, you can spy down to the Stables, Blacksmith, and Farm for any incoming groups or to check on the progress of your attack. Sentry Totem can also be useful, especially at Blacksmith, Farm and Mine, where you can hide in buildings. Alterac Valley AV can be difficult for Shaman, because it's often a ranged zerg-fest. An Elemental Shaman can hang back and cast Chain Lightning and Lightning Bolt into big fights, but Enhancement Shaman are susceptible to AOE attacks, as well as melee assaults. Tab-selecting opponents to cast Purge can be very effective, especially effective against Paladins, and anyone relying on Power Word: Fortitude or Arcane Intellect. For direct damage kills, a Shaman with Nature's Swiftness can cast a normal Chain Lightning, pop NS, and then follow with another Chain Lightning. This can be of great use in AV because you're almost guaranteed three targets for each Chain Lightning. Using a Shock spell will often finish off your target, should it be in range. If you're hanging out of the fight to heal, using Chain Heal on the melee is very mana efficient. With three targets, it's the most effective heal in the Shaman arsenal, and everyone in the big fight below will appreciate every little bit of healing you can add to the mix. Shaman do have one trick up their sleeve specific to AV - the notorious archers in each tower have huge range and decent DPS - they need to be killed to make progress into the Enemy camp. A Shaman can kill them at their maximum range using Windwall Totem, Stoneskin Totem, Healing Stream Totem and Lightning Shield. Continuously refresh Lightning Shield while healing yourself. Those archers have something like 4000 hp and will die quickly from Lightning Shield. This is possibly the only real use for Windwall Totem in the game. Further, if as a Draenei shaman, you are grouped with the main tank during the Captain Galvangar fight, dropping a Tremor Totem can be invaluable, as he intermittently casts Intimidating Shout during the battle. Preventing the main tank from losing Galvangar's focus will save the lives of his/her healers and the higher DPS players in the room. This is especially crucial as Galvangar is usually engaged while the Enemy has no local graveyards captured, usually sending dead players all the way back to Stormpike. See Also *Shaman: Working with Other Classes *Shaman: How to Kill A... *Shaman: How to Help A... Category:Shamans Category:Tactics